A few months later, the lawyer Le Hir imagined the plan of a vast underground network comprising six intersecting lines and passing below the Seine.
At the beginning of the Third Republic, various projects were presented to the municipality.
One included two lines, north-south and east-west. Another provided for a series of tracks starting like rays from a central point, the Palais-Royal, and ending at the main stations. Still others saw the Bastille as a central station.
In 1881, the engineer Chrétien proposed an entirely aerial railway. The idea was taken up by several of his colleagues. Angély suggested building tracks supported by rows of columns, the stations being installed in the houses.
Another, more daring, planned to superimpose the two tracks instead of placing them next to each other. Very satisfied with his plan, he concluded with this strange remark:I would like the engineer to consider it a matter of self-esteem on his part not to hide the metropolitan underground as something to be ashamed of!
However, lovers of Paris were indignant at the thought of one day seeing their city disfigured by a series of dreadful viaducts. A commission was founded (in which Victor Hugo participated, a few months before his death) to watch over the aesthetics of the capital.
This did not prevent the partisans of the aerial metro from continuing to fight for the adoption of their project. Extraordinary lucubrations emerged. Thus, in 1891, an inventor seriously proposed the creation of a quadruple aerial railway along the course of the Seine and passing six meters above the bridges!
At that time, however, the he engineer Berlier had taken up Le Hir's plans and was seriously studying a project for an underground route which would serve as the basis for the final project.
While the specialists were working, the Paris city council fought against the claims of certain private companies wishing to annex the construction of the future metro. The most enterprising were the railway companies:for a long time they had been looking for a way to extend their lines inside the city.